Dirty John and Other True Stories of Outlaws and Outsiders

By: Christopher Goffard

Narrated by: George Newbern

A collection of newspaper stories by award-winning Los Angeles Times reporter Christopher Goffard—including “Dirty John,” the basis for the hit podcast and the upcoming Bravo scripted series starring Connie Britton and Eric Bana.

Since its release in fall 2017, the “Dirty John” podcast—about a conman who terrorizes a Southern California family—has been downloaded more than 20 million times, and will soon premiere as a scripted drama on Bravo starring Connie Britton and Eric Bana. The story, which also ran as a print series in the Los Angeles Times, wasn’t unfamiliar terrain to its writer, Christopher Goffard. Over two decades at newspapers from Florida to California, Goffard has reported probingly on the shadowy, unseen corners of society. This book gathers together for the first time “Dirty John” and the rest of his very best work.

“The $40 Lawyer” provides an inside account of a young public defender’s rookie year in the legal trenches. “Framed” offers an unblinking chronicle of suburban mayhem (and is currently being developed by Netflix as a film starring Julia Roberts). A man wrongly imprisoned for rape, train-riding runaways in love, a Syrian mother forced to leave her children in order to save them, a boy who grows up to become a cop as a way of honoring his murdered sister, another boy who struggles with the knowledge that his father is on death row: these stories reveal the complexities of human nature, showing people at both their most courageous and their most flawed.

Goffard shared in the Los Angeles Times’ Pulitzer Prize for Public Service in 2011 and has twice been a Pulitzer finalist for feature writing. This collection—a must-read for fans of both true-crime and first-rate narrative nonfiction—underscores his reputation as one of today’s most original journalistic voices.

A Unique Spin: True Crime Stories & Other Musings

Good stuff, well written, unique voice with u,pique plots and characters--all true. which makes it scarier.

Welcomed Voyeurism

I found this to definitely be an enjoyable read (listen)... a glimpse into the lives of strangers with plot twists, wins and losses. The author brings a bit of poetry in to each one of the stories making you fall quite easily into their worlds.

Fascinating People Inhabit These Essays

Great book and a wonderful performance!

The title essay and another one (my favorite) are the two longest, and are the two that deal directly with crimes and criminals. "Dirty John" and "Framed" both delve deeply into the two cases, and even if you are familiar with both of them (as I was), you will still learn new details.

Other essays are shorter, and some do not go into background information. The people you will meet include a young lawyer, a Syrian woman who had to leave her family behind, a boy whose father is in prison for murder, and teens who travel the country by train and live a "hobo" existence, often with tragic results.

If you enjoy well-written non-fiction, and "meeting" people with interesting stories that you will most likely never meet in person, you will definitely like this book.

nice collection of stories

I enjoyed this collection. Not quite a five star book, but it was good overall.

Essentially bait and switch.

Quit after 3 pointless stories. I'll listen to the podcast. Author is palming off stories that have nothing to do with crime. The stories aren't even interesting. I wish I could get my money back.